What a call costs on zlicx, worked through

Per-minute prices for voice AI are hard to compare, because they often bundle some costs and leave others out. Our approach is to show the formula and let you do the arithmetic.

The formula

On zlicx a call is made up of three charges, all in rupees:

• AI usage: what the speech and language providers charge, plus 5%.
• Telephony: your carrier's charge with a 20% markup.
• Platform fee: ₹1 for each connected minute, counted by the second.

Indian numbers from Plivo or Vobiz rent at ₹200 per 30 days plus GST. See current pricing for the details and for anything that has changed since this was written.

One call, worked through

Plivo's India rate is ₹0.38 a minute before markup, billed in 30-second units. The AI cost below is an assumption chosen to make the sums easy, not a quote, because it depends on the models you pick.

Assume a three-minute connected call and ₹2.50 per minute of AI cost.

So under those assumptions, 1,000 such calls come to about ₹12,250, plus number rental and GST. That works out at roughly ₹4.08 a minute.

With your own SIP trunk, the telephony line disappears from our bill, and your carrier invoices you instead. See using your own SIP trunk.

What moves the number

• Model choice. AI usage is usually the largest and most adjustable line. Test a cheaper model on simple calls before assuming you need the biggest one.
• Call length. A rambling prompt makes longer calls, which raises all three charges.
• Prompt caching. Where a provider supports it, cached tokens are billed at their cache rates.

Costs that are not on this bill

An honest budget also includes:

• Staff time to review calls and handle the requests the agent collects.
• Your engineers' time to connect tools and keep them working.
• Unanswered outbound attempts, which your carrier may charge for under its own rules.
• GST at 18%, which is added when you top up your wallet.

Our call cost worksheet has these lines ready, with formulas. Replace the sample inputs with your own quotes.

How you pay

There is no subscription. zlicx uses a prepaid rupee wallet, topped up through Razorpay from ₹500 to ₹50,000 in ₹100 steps, with a signup credit of ₹500 subject to eligibility. Each top-up gets a tax invoice. Automatic recharge isn't available yet.

For a high-volume or self-hosted setup, pricing is quoted per deployment, so talk to us. The COD confirmation page is a useful example of a short call to model.